Hardly Harmless: A local 11-year-old is mastering his second martial art.

Bobby Rodriguez of McAllen is a wiry, shaggy-haired, 75-pound 11-year-old.

Clad in black shorts and ear protectors, he is hardly fearsome. But competitors call this intense sixth grader “Tarzan” and “The Magician” on the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu tournament circuit, where the karate black-belt began competing a year ago. (Check out "The Magician," a Monitor Multimedia video production)

In complex and rapid movements his teacher calls “kinetic chess,” Rodriguez can wrestle an opponent into any position.

A year and a half after taking up the sport, Rodriguez is a two-time national champion.

“The kid came in hungry to learn,” said his teacher Miguel Tinajero. “He constantly was asking questions. He was determined to learn, to master whatever subject. That’s not normal for a 10-year-old kid.

“I could tell right away when he walked in that this kid was going to be a champion.”

Rodriguez trains between 10 and 20 hours a week, grappling with other students and doing conditioning exercises on the blue mat at Tinajero’s McAllen Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Academy.

Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is far from the form- and appearance-centered karate forms Rodriguez has studied since he was 5 years old. While competitions have point systems for moves, the goal of each match is to force a “submission” from the opponent.

If a competitor is caught in a lock or choke and could have a limb broken or his oxygen cut off, he will “tap out,” ending the match.

“The referee cannot stop the match until somebody submits, verbally or physically. It’s intense,” Tinajero said.

But what looks like brutal and desperate scrambling on the floor is, Rodriguez says, a series of moves and techniques that could keep him from getting hurt in a real-life fight.

“If you’re in a street fight, the fight will go to the ground more than it will be standing up, and jiu-jitsu is about fighting on the ground,” he said. “If you get in a fight and you don’t know any of this, you won’t defend yourself and you will get hurt.”

He’s not afraid to get hurt, although his father, Bobby Sr., said he is glad that his son is prepared for danger.

“He’s real humble and kindhearted, and he really gets into it,” he said proudly.

So into it that Bobby is considering taking up a third martial art some day. Inspired by Ultimate Fighting competitions on television, he hopes to round out his arsenal of techniques with some kickboxing.

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Sara Perkins covers western Hidalgo County, Starr County and general assignments for

The Monitor. You can reach her at (956) 683-4472. For this and other local stories, visit www.themonitor.com.